Thursday, 8 March, 2007

by Daryl Manzie
104.1 TOP FM - Territory Talk

We've got a special guest in the studio this morning, Norman Fry the Chief
Executive Officer of the Northern Land Council's joining us and Norman's going
to be talking about a number of areas that have been in the news in which the
Northern Land Council's involved in.

REPTR Norm, welcome to the show.

FRY Good morning Daryl and good morning to all your listeners.

REPTR Now mate the first thing I want to talk about is the consultations the
Northern Land Council's been undertaking in regards to the establishment of a
radioactive waste facility here in the Territory. You've come under a bit of
criticism by some of the so-called green groups, but first of all what actually
is the role of the NLC in dealing with the traditional owners.

FRY Well the Northern Land Council is required by law under the Northern
Territory Aboriginal Land Rights Act to conduct consultations that deal with any
development proposal or any proposal that any person or any interested party,
whether they'd be the Commonwealth Government of Australia or a mining company
or for a railway project or for some pipelines, or whatever it is the Northern
Land Council, all the land councils in fact in the Territory are required by
law, Australian law, to conduct consultations with the people that own the land.
And at the end of the day the people that own the land make the decision about
whatever that development proposal is.

REPTR Now it's interesting you just mentioned a number of projects that are sort
of happening in the Territory and people should be aware that all of those went
through a consultation process with the land councils as part of the process.
And they're all working very well.

FRY Correct and they all had opponents as well. And there are very many
groups of people including environmental groups who have posed a whole range of
projects on Aboriginal land in the Northern Land Council's region. The fears
have never translated out to real things, what we're seeing with the Muckaty
issue with the nuclear waste repository is a lot of scaremongering, a lot of
misinformation, it's quite divisive, it can be quite silly at times the level of
discussions that it descends to. But at the end of the day, we're required by
law to give the proper information, factual information and to that extent if it
involves a nuclear waste repository, then the relevant scientists, people who
really know what they're talking about in these matters, along with our
anthropologists to make sure that the right traditional owners are actually
before the scientists and the lawyers are also there present to make sure that
the meeting runs properly and the relevant information is given across. Now
this happens with all projects that happen on Aboriginal land, so whether it's a
mining project or a very conceptual thing to get your head around like a railway
or whether it's a series of pipelines that traverse a whole range of different
peoples country and different groups, you've got to go through this process.

REPTR And I think it's important to stress that you don't have any bias either
way in regards to these issues. It's bringing people, if it's environmental
matters you bring environmental scientists, if you've got you know in regards to
this particular issue you've got a whole range of scientists. I mean that is
the role and then the decision is made by people.

FRY Correct. When you take the politics out of it and look at the science of
the nuclear waste repository, that is the thing that counts. So whenever you
are making a decision about any proposal as I said, what counts is the facts
that's put before people. And factual information is the basis upon which
informed consent is sought. So the Northern Land Council cannot sign off on
anything to do with Section 19 or Section 23 agreements under the Land Rights
Act if in fact there hasn't been informed consents reached.

REPTR Do you get upset sometimes Norman when it appears that people don't think
that Aboriginal people have the capacity to go through a process and understand
and make their own decisions?

FRY Absolutely, and it's very disheartening and whenever people don't get the
ideological position that they want, it must be the land council that's at fault.

REPTR And both sides of politics are guilty of this.

FRY Absolutely. And the end of the day it's what traditional owners want on
their land and if something stacks up then they'll make a decision.

REPTR And also I think we should stress that you take anthropological advice to
make sure that the appropriate and proper traditional owners are involved. And
quite often you get people -

FRY - Absolutely, and that's a legal process and some of the stuff you see in
the media from time to time the term 'traditional owner' is often banded around
very loosely. And it's a bit rich when the land councils in the territory are
often told to suck eggs about who the traditional owners are, because we have a
whole anthropological department, and there are anthropologists dedicated to the
seven regions of the Northern Land Council and so we know exactly who is who and
at the end of the day the right people make the decision.

REPTR And of course, I mean again, people should understand that that's the
legal requirement and if you don't do it properly you're liable for legal
challenge -

FRY - Well we can get sued.

REPTR Yeah, and you've done pretty well so far. Now can I just ask you now on
another subject, ...